'It just has to be your day' / $355 million Mega Millions jackpot has Californians dreaming big

2007-03-05 20:30:49 PST -- It's California Problem Gambling Awareness Week, but don't tell that to the millions of people clamoring for a chance to win one of the nation's biggest-ever lottery jackpots.

On the back of each Mega Millions ticket is a suggestion to "play responsibly," but on the front are numbers, and Tuesday at 8 p.m. a combination of those digits is expected to be worth $355 million.

The jackpot, California's largest since voters here approved lotteries in 1984, is prompting game players to quit jobs, buy mansions and travel to the tropics -- all without leaving the comfort of their imaginations.

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"I realize I don't have a chance, but nobody's got a chance. So the way I look at it, I have a 50-50 chance -- either I win it or someone else wins it," reasoned Barrie Green, 60, after buying a single ticket Monday afternoon at the Merritt Restaurant and Bakery near his home in Oakland.

"Good luck, sir," said cashier Weida Han, who chose not to explain to Green that his odds of winning -- and being able to quit his job driving cars to auctions -- are 1 in 175,711,536.

The estimated value of Tuesday's drawing in the twice-weekly game is just $10 million less than the record high set in February 2006 by another multi-state game, Powerball, in which California does not participate. The drawing will be held in New York's Times Square.

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It couldn't come at a better time for the California lottery, which in recent months has been faced with an unusual problem: People are winning too often in the 12-state Mega Millions game, which California joined in June 2005.

Wins prevent the prize pool from rolling over and growing irresistible. From July to December of last year, just one jackpot climbed over $150 million, an amount that will buy far fewer yachts and Tuscan villas than $355 million.

The result: The state lottery revised its forecast for sales in the current fiscal year, which ends in June, from $3.6 billion to $3.2 billion. That means $1.13 billion to public education rather than $1.27 billion.

Lottery spokesman Rob McAndrews said the state lottery takes problem gambling seriously and spends $100,000 a year fighting it. The agency is airing public-service announcements on radio and television all month.

The bad news, Roberts said, is that the lottery can be an addiction or a "gateway" into more costly gambling. Roberts said he was buying coffee at a gas station Monday morning when an elderly man bought 200 tickets.

"It's a little past a game at that point," Roberts said.

If the lottery is a game, the Merritt Restaurant and Bakery is a modest field of dreams. Near cakes and custard confections, the owners set aside a cash register dedicated only to Mega Millions, the Daily Derby and other ways to pick and scratch.

They plan to use two cashiers today -- one to take money and the other to issue tickets, but still expect a line out the door. If someone picks the winning numbers, the business gets $1 million.

On Monday, some players were not to be bothered.

"I'm trying to concentrate here," said Fred Giddings as he hunched over a tableful of tickets, staring at the numbers like they were pieces of a difficult Sudoku puzzle. He said he would turn in the tickets later, when his lucky cashier was back from her break.

Joe Perkins, 59, allowed a machine to randomly pick numbers for the six tickets he bought. "Age and birthdays, it really doesn't work," said the retired U.S. Postal Service supervisor. "It just has to be your day."

Pointing back toward the cashier, Perkins said, "That's the American dream right there, and it'll only cost you a dollar."

P.J. Moriarty, a retired San Francisco police officer now living in Oakland, bought five tickets. He said he sometimes calculates lottery payouts in his head as a way of falling asleep at night -- like counting sheep. But he was having trouble getting his head around the $355 million.

"It would become a full-time problem trying to spend the money," he said. "You can only eat one steak a night."

Also without a firm spending plan was Annabell Forsse, an 88-year-old neighborhood resident with a wide smile who bought two tickets.

"When you're this age, you don't think about buying a lot of stuff. And I don't drive, so I don't need a car," she said. "This just gives me something to do. I'm by myself and I get lonely. My husband passed away last year after 65 years of marriage. I have to stay busy."